Blue Murder (13 page)

It wasn’t a hard house to search; quite the opposite, everything had its place. Drawers held neatly folded underwear, cupboards opened to reveal their contents without need for rifling through. Janine was impressed with Mrs Tulley’s wardrobe; everything of impeccable quality, classic styles that would resist the fickle trends of fashion, nothing trashy or worn out.

Matthew Tulley’s clothes divided into work (suits and shirts) and home (Land’s End and Hawkshead). A penchant for check shirts and corduroy trousers. The books on his bedside table told them nothing new.
The Organic Gardener
and
A History Of Britain
. At her side a guide book to Singapore, a copy of
Elle
.

She and Richard took a side of the room each and worked systematically, replacing items carefully. She opened a drawer in the dressing table, found a selection

of fancy underwear. Silk and satin slips, lacy bras and pants, camisoles, black suspender belts. She checked beneath them. Nothing. She picked up a pair of scarlet briefs, slippery fabric edged in cream lace. They were crotchless. She folded them quickly, suddenly embarrassed.

‘The Lemon asked me if I really thought a woman was capable of such a thing.’

Richard smiled.

‘No imagination,’ she said.

Richard’s phone rang. He took the call. ‘The message that she left on the sister’s phone is still there,’ he told Janine, ‘very precise: ‘it’s only half past nine’.’

‘Neatly establishing time of day.’

‘Exactly.’

‘Too neat?’

‘No motive.’ He reminded her.

Richard Mayne knew, like a catechism, that there were three elements to look for in a murder case – motive, opportunity and preparatory acts. As yet Mrs Tulley wasn’t known to have any motive for killing her husband (unlike Ferdie Gibson who had plenty), and they hadn’t established any preparatory acts. As for opportunity she had access to knives like the rest of the population but whether she had the strength to gut a man was anybody’s guess. People could surprise you. Until the CCTV tape showed them otherwise, she had the opportunity to return to Whalley Range and commit the crime. One out of three, maybe. Not great odds but you had to start somewhere.

On the landing Richard searched through the airing cupboard and came away empty handed. There were three other bedrooms, one of which was used for storage. All the boxes were neatly labelled; Christmas Decorations, China Tea Service, Velvet Drapes (Brown), Ski-clothes. A random check in some of the least accessible ones showed that each contained precisely what was written on its label.

‘No point in going through them all,’ Janine said. ‘If and when we get a warrant …’

Of the other two bedrooms, one was being used by Emma whose hastily gathered belongings were still half in her overnight bag, and the other room with its twin beds looked as though it had never been used.

*****

‘Hello, Paula,’ said Shap. ‘Can I have a word?’

He’d been at Steel quarter of an hour, sitting on one of the high metal stools at the bar, sipping a strong lager and listening to chit-chat on the other side of the counter. Waiting till he was ready.

She frowned slightly. Broke off from stacking glasses on the shelves. ‘Do I know you?’

Shap flipped his identity wallet open. ‘DS Shap. Just a routine enquiry. We’re trying to get in touch with Dean Hendrix. Thought you might know where he was.’

‘Dean?’ she said, frown deepening.

‘Yes, Dean. Your boyfriend.’

She pressed her lips together. ‘What’s it about?’

‘Nothing to worry about,’ said Shap, ‘we’re talking to everyone who lives in Denholme Avenue, see if they saw anything in connection with the murder there yesterday. Matthew Tulley. Your old deputy head, eh?’

‘Oh, right.’ She nodded, wary but not panicked. There was a faint rattle as the beads in her hair knocked against each other.

‘So, if you can tell us where we can find Dean?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said, ‘I don’t know where he is.’

‘Not at your place then?’

‘No.’

‘That usual? You not knowing where he is?’

She stared at him, eyes guarded. Be like pulling hen’s teeth now. ‘His place of work?’ Shap asked.

‘He’s freelance,’ Paula said, ‘he hasn’t got a regular place.’

Could mean anything, freelance. Good, bad or indifferent. ‘Off working somewhere then, is he?’

‘I don’t know,’ Paula said. Glancing to the left, two customers waiting. ‘I’ve got to get on.’

‘He’ll be in touch though?’ Shap lifted his eye brows. ‘Not dumped you, has he?’ Half-smile on his lips. She said nothing. ‘If you hear from him get him to give us a bell.’ He put his card on the bar, raised his glass in salute and drank it down. She pocketed the card, moved away to serve the couple. Shots of tequila, slices of lime, salt.

Shap watched, waited until she’d handed over their change. ‘Paula. I was thinking, he’ll have a mobile, won’t he? Give me the number, I’ll get in touch direct.’

She looked away quickly, blinked, looking up as though something in the air would tell her what to do. Swung her gaze back to his. ‘I’ll tell him to call you,’ she said. Wheeled away before he could persist, through the door to the kitchens.

*****

Downstairs, Janine and Richard explored the stylish dining room with its Moroccan tiled table, glass shelves and carefully arranged candelabras and glazed pots. They found nothing. The search of the lounge was fruitless too.

‘You know what strikes me,’ she said, keeping her voice low, ‘is how impersonal it all is. There’s no clutter, no letters and photos or mementoes,’ she paused. ‘No kids?’ Could that explain it?

‘I haven’t any, either,’ said Richard, ‘but I still have stuff. Not that I’ve had chance to unpack it yet.’

‘Photo there,’ she nodded at the wedding snap in its fine golden frame. Lesley Tulley in a cream knee-length dress, short veil, leaning against her husband beneath a rose arbour, head against his shoulder. His hands around her waist. They looked very happy. Lesley Tulley said they had a happy marriage. Why did Janine have doubts about that? Something about Lesley’s reactions? About the feel of the house too.

It wasn’t just the elegance and the space; it was a mood, a tension in the atmosphere. Someone has just been murdered, she reminded herself; could have something to do with it.

The study looked more like what she was used to. Files and papers lay on Matthew Tulley’s desk. All of it related to St. Columbus High School. Richard went through his briefcase.

She examined the shelves. A couple of silver flight cases and some padded bags containing camcorders and photographic accessories. The rest given over to books. She ran her eye along the rows; no fiction to speak of, some books on jazz and photography but mostly education and management books, papers from various examining boards, thick files relating to Standards and the National Curriculum.

Richard began to search the filing cabinet while Janine went through the desk. In the bottom drawer, underneath everything else, she found a pack of condoms.

‘What have we got here?’ She held them up to show Richard. ‘He’s playing away?’

Richard gestured. Could be.

Why else hide them? Janine thought.

When they checked in the kitchen, the washing machine was empty. Janine peered out, there was nothing on the rotary dryer in the garden. She went through to the sisters, now waiting in the lounge.

‘We’d like to have a look in the garage.’

The double garage stood to the left of the house, its side entrance a few steps from the side door that led out of the kitchen. Lesley unlocked it and led them in.

‘Thank you, we can lock up after if you leave the key.’

Janine waited for Lesley to go. There was a tumble dryer in the corner but it was empty. She looked along the workbench that ran across the back of the space. Tools neatly stored, nails and screws in containers. No knife. No empty place shouting ‘here was a knife’. She shook her head at Richard.

They took a turn round the garden. It was a fresh day, cold enough for hats and gloves but the sky was a vivid blue, setting off the bare branches and the dark skeletons of the trees. ‘No sign of fresh digging,’ Janine pointed out, thinking still about the washing Richard had seen.

‘Need a warrant to get a proper look.’

‘No chance, yet.’

She crushed a sprig of conifer between her fingers, sniffed the pine scent. ‘You got a garden, your new place?’

‘Flat. Not even a window box.’

Janine nodded towards the side of the house and they turned that way. ‘Ours isn’t bad, Pete used to do a lot. The lawn’s more of a football pitch now though, Tom practising his flying tackles.’ She was curious about Richard; beyond saying that he was single again he hadn’t volunteered anything else about his marriage break-up to her. ‘Wendy still down there?’

‘Yep. We sold up, she got her own place.’ His voice was neutral, no clue as to whether he was sad or glad.

Janine nodded at the wheelie bin. Richard rolled his eyes but moved forward. Janine’s phone went off, the lousy marching drill number, Richard recoiled.

‘Hello?’

‘DS Shap, boss. Paula, Dean Hendrix’s girl – claims not to know his whereabouts. Not exactly falling over backwards to help us out.’

Janine sighed, another obstacle. ‘Thanks, Shap,’ she turned to Richard. ‘No joy from the Hendrix girl friend.’

Richard opened the top of the bin and they peered in. Bin-liners neatly tied. ‘Take it all away.’ Janine said.

‘Without a warrant?’

‘With Mrs Tulley’s permission, though she’d be an idiot to have dumped anything in that.’ When would they get a break, some movement in the case? ‘Christ, I hope forensics have something we can get our teeth into. Or the eyewitness gives us a positive result. If we can just put one of them there.’ Richard lifted the bags from the bin and placed them beside it.

‘Right,’ Janine said briskly, ‘let’s see what she’s got to say about her dirty washing.’

Emma was just leaving when they joined Lesley in the house. She needed to call home for more clothes and to sort her flat out for the following days when she would be staying at Lesley’s. Once she’d gone, Janine told Lesley, ‘we’re eager to locate some clothing that was here yesterday in the washing machine.’

‘Sorry?’

‘Sports clothing, jog-pants something like that. In yesterday morning’s wash?’

Lesley’s brow creased in a frown, she shook her head. ‘I didn’t wash anything yesterday.’

Janine glanced at Richard. An innocent mix-up or something more serious?

‘You’re sure, please think very carefully.’

Lesley continued to shake her head. ‘I’m sure.’

Janine stood up first, outwardly calm but thinking all the while that now they had something more to go on, now she had a place to start, a loose thread to pull on, and she couldn’t wait.

DS Shap knocked on Ferdie Gibson’s door more loudly. ‘Come on,’ he said under his breath. He thought he heard sounds inside so he waited. He glanced down the road where two elderly women were in conversation. Bundled up in woolly hats, coats and gloves.

At last the door was pulled back and Ferdie stood there. Hair so short you could see the bumps on his skull and a smudged tattoo, some sort of moth or something on his neck.

Shap showed him his ID. ‘Morning Ferdinand,’ he said.

‘Ferdie,’ the lad replied.

‘Whatever. Can I come in a moment?’

Ferdie looked as though he was about to refuse.

‘Unless you want all the neighbours knowing your business.’ He swung his eyes to the old women.

In the drab living room Shap explained that they had a witness who had seen a man answering Ferdie’s description leaving the allotments where Matthew Tulley had been killed.

‘Well, it weren’t me,’ Ferdie replied. ‘I wasn’t anywhere near there.’

‘Where were you, Ferdie?’

‘In bed, I told them others.’

‘You sure about that?’

‘Yes,’ he said aggressively.

‘Sure enough to prove it.’

‘What d’ya mean?’ His eyes narrowed, emphasising the feral look of his features.

‘We want to hold an identity parade, see if this witness can pick out who he saw.’

‘Well, it weren’t me.’

‘So you’d attend the parade?’

‘Why should I?’

‘Clear your name. There’s a lot of people muttering about how you had a grudge against Matthew Tulley. You’d already gone for him with a knife before, hadn’t you?’

‘Yeah. And you know what he did, give me brain damage, that’s what. I can’t concentrate, I get these attacks. And he’s still teaching.’

‘Not now he isn’t.’

‘And I’ll dance on his grave but I didn’t do him.’

‘Prove it. Or are you scared? Got something to hide?’

Ferdie clenched his fist. Shap could see a muscle in his jaw tighten. ‘What time?’

‘Two o’ clock. South Manchester nick.’

‘Right,’ Ferdie said, his teeth still closed together. ‘Maybe I’ll show.’

‘And we’ll all know what to think if you don’t,’ Shap said.

*****

Shap snatched the tenner from Butchers and murmured ‘You won’t see that again, mate.’ He turned to DC Chen. ‘Fancy a flutter?’ She nodded, keen to be accepted by the more established team members. Before she had chance to put her name down for one of the three runners in Shap’s book, Chief Inspector Lewis began Sunday evening’s meeting.

Janine could sense the team were tired, getting ragged round the edges but she needed to use this chance to galvanise them. ‘We all know we’ve had our magical 24 hours without a result but that doesn’t mean we give up now. It means we work harder, we work bloody hard. Things are starting to open up.’

She referred to the photos on board. ‘Three possible suspects. Lesley Tulley. Motive?’ She was met with shrugs and grimaces. ‘Exactly. Nada, nothing. Tulley claims the marriage was happy. No friends, barely any family. Married nine years. She can’t have children. But there are condoms in Mr Tulley’s desk.’ She paused. ‘Cherchez la femme? Could give us motive. No rumours of another woman but we’re going through his e-mail contacts. Mr Tulley’s diaries, nothing obvious though we’ve some unexplained appointments. Other evidence?’